Pensive

Tuesday, June 14, 2005

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

Is "Pajamas" too frivolous a name for the blogger portal coming soon to a screen near you? One of Roger L. Simon’s readers thinks not:

Gravitas is acquired, not given in a name. Take Google for example. Is "Google" a suitably dignified name for one of the most respected and feared corporations on the planet? The clear answer is no, it isn't. Does that matter? No, it doesn't. . . The dotcom boom saw an explosion of silly names, most likely because such decisions were being made by 20-year-olds in dorm rooms rather than by boards of directors in office suites. Many of the dotcom survivors have extremely stupid and/or non sequitur names (Google, Amazon, Yahoo) while many that went down in flames had conservative or purely descriptive names (pets.com, jobs.com). I don't mean to suggest that silly names actually helped, but they didn't seem to hurt.